Understanding
by Bakura's Guardian Angel
Summary: A day with Ryou and Bakura. Ryou must constantly stop the Spirit from breaking rules, cheating, and stealing, but Bakura doesn't really understand why.


**Bakura's Gaurdian Angel**: Ok. I have decided that it is impossible to write on just one story consistantly, so here is a second One-Shot that I wrote between chapter 3-4 of Return with Vengeance (if you don't know what that is, check it out!) Hope you enjoy. I am not especially good at constant humor, so there are just some funnyish parts here and there, but mostly it just is what it is. Anyways. (I am actually working on one that is basically constant humor, but it takes me longer because humor is not something that comes to me as naturally as tragic/sad stories, which I also avoid writing too often...I need to find a happy medium because I've started plenty of sad ones, but I don't want people to think I enjoy writing my characters as depressed so...anyways. This is just random. Please enjoy. R&R if you like it, or if you don't. Recommend if you think its good enough for that.

* * *

The day started out just like any other day. It was Monday morning and Ryou woke up at 7:00 to his absolutely, drive-you-completely-insane, piece of crap alarm clock. After slapping his alarm until he finally hit the power button, he sat up and looked around his room sleepily. Making a mental note (for the 100th time) to buy a new Alarm, he got out of his bed.

He opened the window to let some fresh air into his stuffy room. Then he methodically began tidying things. Putting away a pair of shoes, picking up some stray papers, straitening out the sheets on his bed. It was something his father had used to make him do, and it had become habit, and habit had become part of his morning ritual. After ensuring that his room was clean enough for his tastes, he began working through his closet. He pulled out his blue jacket and uniform that the school required he wear and lay them on the bed before moving over to his desk.

He opened the top drawer and rummaged through the papers until he found what he was looking for. The Millennium Ring. Pulling it out, he promptly tossed it onto his bed beside his neatly folded clothes.

An irritated voice spoke up from where he had tossed the Ring carelessly.

"Oh, so the _clothes, _get placed nicely and neatly, but the Millennium Ring gets thrown around like a plastic joke shop toy! It _IS _antique you know." Spirit Bakura was sitting on the bed, his arms folded across his chest in a melodramatic, offended way.

"Oh, what? Ya, sure." Ryou was now crawling under his bed to look for something or other. Bakura let out a huff of breath and looked disgustedly at the blue uniform sitting beside him on the bed.

"Hey Ryou?" He asked, picking up the jacket daintily, like it was contaminated.

"What?" Ryou was still distracted, trying to extract a thick binder that was bulging with papers from the dusty corner under his bed.

"Why do you even wear this?" He wadded up the jacket into a blue-uniform-ball, and walked over to Ryou's closet to find something that appealed to him more.

"Wear what?" Ryou's head popped out from under the bed, only to be smothered in his freshly crumpled school uniform, thrown by Bakura. "This?" Ryou asked, pulling it off his face and folding it back on the bed, doing his best to smooth out the wrinkles. Bakura nodded as he flipped through hangers and clean piles of laundry.

"I wear it because the school tells us we have to, or we get sent to detention." Ryou was just beginning to pull the jacket on over a white t-shirt when he was hit with yet another article of clothing. It was a black muscle tee with a picture of a death metal band on it. He clawed it off his face and looked at it curiously. He hadn't even realized he owned this shirt, but then it occurred to him that his Yami must have stolen it when he took his body out for whatever reason.

"You want me to wear this?" He asked choking on laughter. The prospect of him wearing a muscle shirt was funny even to himself.

"Yes, I do." Bakura said, glaring at him. Ryou took another look at the shirt, then threw it back at Bakura.

"No. Now put that back, or better yet, return it to whatever store you stole it from." Ryou continued to pull the jacket on, but grabbed the Millennium Ring as an afterthought and slipped it over his neck. Then he buttoned the jacket the rest of the way and began to exit the room. Bakura looked at the shirt in his hands a bit disappointedly and then followed Ryou quickly.

"But RYOOUU!" Bakura whined sarcastically. Then in a more serious tone "You look so ridiculous in that dumb uniform. Besides, what's wrong with breaking a few rules now and then?"

"Ok well, lets see. A lot of things actually!" Ryou leaned against his kitchen table and poured a glass of milk for himself. "First of all. Since when do I ever break rules? Second, it's just not ok. And third, it was _stolen_ so I wouldn't wear it regardless. It goes against my…ethical values." He gulped down the milk and walked past his glaring Yami to grab his book bag.

"Now, I'm going to school. Are you coming?" Ryou called from the entryway. Bakura sighed and slouched out of the kitchen to the front door.

"Ok, whatever. Wear your dumb clothes. Lets go." Then Bakura walked out the door. Ryou shook his head and followed, locking the apartment behind him. He had to run to catch up with the spirit, who was already at the bottom of the stairs leading out of the building.

Ryou thought at the spirit, '_Wait up! I'm the one who has to actually go to school!'_

'_How about you just don't go today. School is boring anyways.' _They began to walk down the street, Bakura invisible to all the people up and about already.

'_I have a test today. In math.' _Thought Ryou, '_Besides. Going to school, and getting there __**on time**_ _is just good etiquette. I don't want to have a bad reputation with the teachers.'_

'_You are such a whiner. So what if the teacher's don't like you. Do you __**like **__being a teacher's pet? And, cool people always sluff. I would.' _

'_Well it's a good thing you aren't me then.' _The spirit was silent for a moment, and then grinned evilly.

'_I could be…you __**did **__wear the Millennium Ring today.' _

'_But you wouldn't.' _Ryou looked sneakily up at his darker half so that people wouldn't think he was strange, looking up at nothing.

'_Have I _ever_ hesitated before?' _He asked disdainfully.

'_No… But 'Kura! Please don't, ok? Not today.' _Ryou surreptitiously gave the spirit his puppy dog eyes. '_Please!!' _Bakura frowned at him. Little cheater. He couldn't say no to those eyes, and Ryou knew it, unless of course there was a chance that he might gain a Millennium Item, but this was just fun and games to the Spirit.

Bakura hissed, _'Fine. But don't get used to having your way.' _Ryou smiled and continued down the street. Bakura could see the school ahead, and he groaned. On to 6 and a half hours of pure misery. This was torture that even he couldn't bear! How did kids do this every freaking day!? He almost _preferred_ the Shadow Realm to this stupid **school**. At least there, it was dark.

'_So what class do you have first' _Bakura asked, trying to figure out which hour would be the most horrible to endure. He noticed that Ryou paled a little bit. First hour must be a bad one.

'_I have math first. We're taking that huge math test I told you about. I suck at math tests!' _Ryou entered the classroom and walked to his desk, right in the middle of the class. He waved half-heartedly to Yugi and Tea who were talking animatedly over in their desks by the windows. Bakura did a mix between a hiss and a growl and stuck his tongue out at them. The bell rang. Immediately the teacher began handing out the tests.

'_Holy…that is one HUGE packet. You have to do all of that in 45 minutes?' _Bakura smirked at Ryou. '_Do they think you're miniature Einsteins, or what? Good luck pulling off this one Ryou.' _

Ryou glared at him. _'Thanks for your support.' _The test was placed before him and the teacher said, "You may now begin. At five minutes to the bell, all tests must be on my desk."

Ryou began working. He breezed through the first two and a half pages, but then slowed. They were working with measurements of polygons, circles, and triangles, and using algebraic methods to solve equations. Ryou tapped his head with the pencil, trying to pull the answers out of his mind. He was uncomfortably aware of the clock, which seemed to be moving faster then normal.

Bakura watched him struggle with the problems. He _might _have helped, but he didn't know how to do even the simplest division, let alone measurements and algebra. When had he had the chance to go to school in his Egyptian life? After all, he was a thief. All he was really good at was stealing and getting under your skin.

Bakura looked around. Everyone seemed to be having troubles with the same problems Ryou was. Except one… Tea was sitting by the window, scribbling away in her little artsy bubble script. She wasn't hesitating at all, and she looked completely confident. Bakura knew from Ryou that Tea was a strait A student. Perhaps there was a way Bakura could help Ryou after all. He dissipated unnoticed from Ryou's side and then reappeared behind Tea.

Meanwhile, Ryou was only just half way finished with the test and there was only ten minutes before he had to have it turned in on the teacher's desk. He was panicking. His fingers tapped a speedy rhythm and his pencil bobbed up and down as his hand shook from the stress. Oh, how he hated tests! He had the worst nerves ever, and then he couldn't remember the answers…

He paused. Suddenly _answers_ were in his mind. It was like they just came floating across his mental vision. Not just answers, but the questions that the answers belonged to as well!

'_You didn't…' _Thought Ryou at the Spirit.

'_You can thank me when you get an A.' _Bakura smiled.

'_Bakura! That is CHEATING! I can't cheat! I'll have to live with the guilt of it for the whole rest of my life!'_

Bakura shook his head in negation. _'Guilt is a concept. If you don't let it concern you, you won't feel it anymore. The same principle applies to pain and offense. Besides, I worked hard to steal those answers.'_

'…_You're invisible, Bakura.'_

Bakura made a noncommittal noise, '_Well… It _was_ hard to get them. Sometimes Tea's arm was covering the answers and so I couldn't see them. Or sometimes she would flip the page before I had finished reading the answers completely. Stealing isn't always easy, even as a spirit…Now don't be so ungrateful and just put the answers down. You only have five minutes.'_

Ryou frowned at the reminder, then at his incomplete test. '_I won't cheat.' _Bakura also frowned…his Hikari was so stubborn. Then he shrugged.

'_Fine. It's your grade.' _

Ryou looked at his test concernedly. The blank questions sat before Ryou; tempting him with the answers that were sitting on the edge of his conscious mind. The buzzer on the math teacher's desk filled his ears and he sighed. He wrote in block letters on the front page of his test INCOMPLETE, underlined it twice, then circled it just for good measure.

The final bell for first period rang and Ryou ran his unfinished test up to the teacher. She smiled understandingly, "Come in tomorrow after school and you can finish."

Ryou smiled his gratitude, grabbed his bag, and ran out the door. For the remainder of 2nd, 3rd, and 4th period, the Spirit remained quiet, but during lunch hour he piped up again. Ryou was walking back up the street and away from the school to get something to eat at the local taco stand. That is, he was, until he realized he had forgotten his wallet at home. He rubbed his growling stomach hungrily and began making his way back to the school. There wouldn't be time to go all the way to his apartment and still get back to the school in time.

'_You know,' _Bakura said suggestively, _'I could easily pick someone's pocket if you would allow me to take over your body for just one teensy second. Then you could get something to eat and go about your day _without_ those hunger pains.'_

'_Bakura, is there a reason you are being especially irritating today?' _Ryou thought snappishly. '_Besides, like I said this morning, I don't use things that are stolen. That includes paying with stolen money.' _

'_But WHY NOT!?' _Bakura cried out inwardly.

'_Remember those 'Ethical Values' I was talking about earlier. Well, this is them again. Do you even understand what ethics and morals are?'_

'_Yes,' _Replied Bakura smartly, '_They are the things that don't allow you to do __**anything**__ fun, or get what you want the easy way.' _

Ryou heaved a sigh, '_No. Ethics are what you believe is right and good. It is your personal system of what is ok to do, and what isn't.'_

'_I don't get it.' _

'_It's hard to explain to you, since you probably don't even have any.' _

Bakura thought about this for a minute, '_So you won't cheat, won't steal, won't break rules, won't hurt anybody, or anything for that matter, all because of your ethical values?' _Ryou nodded his head a fraction of an inch. Bakura suddenly burst out '_That is so WRONG! Are people stupid? Everything would be so much easier if you would just let your little rules drop and do whatever you want!'_

'_See, I knew you wouldn't understand. But then, I didn't really expect you to. But now you know why, when you want me to do something, that I won't. Ethics give you a sense of right and wrong. I don't know how you live without them. There would be no direction in your life. Nothing to tell you what to do; help you make decisions. It would drive me crazy.'_

'_Oh, Hikari. It's easy. You just do whatever you want, and don't worry about the consequences. Simple as that Ryou. If you could be like me, your life would be 10x easier then it is now.'_

'_I have to disagree.' _

'HOW _can you disagree? What could be easier or better then doing whatever you want, whenever you want to?' _Bakura jutted his chin out, emphasizing his question.

'_Having some guidance in your life. Don't you ever feel lost? Like you don't know what you should do?' _Ryou questioned curiously, they were just reaching the school entryway and Ryou trotted up the stairs and headed towards the gym for his Physical Education class.

'_No. I always know what to do.' _Bakura considered thoughtfully.

'_Well that makes one of us.' _Ryou muttered.

'_Sure_._ well I'm going to go to my Soul Room to think about your 'ethics'…' _Said Bakura, departing from Ryou's mind gradually.

"Ok." He said out loud, but quiet enough that no one else would hear. Then, when the Spirit had receded, he smiled, thinking about what the last thing Spirit had said, and laughed loudly, "Yeah right."

* * *

KK. I LOVE REVIEWS! (So do 'Kura and Ryou!) SO REVIEW AND VISIT MY PROFILE TO SEE WHAT IS COMING SOON!


End file.
